The Slush Pile

It was small and out of the way, one of those kitschy eateries that tried after the aesthetic of a bygone age. The theme was Americana and both the menu and decor were trying to take the diner back to when that word meant something, back when a place in Old Sol had been known for checkered tile floors, stiff coffee, and breakfasts that required three different animals to create. The last was the reason Montauk spent every morning there. As far as the retired Inquisitor was concerned there was no finer delicacy in all the stars than drippy eggs, toast soaked with the fat from animal milk, and strips of pork that sizzled on your plate. And considering Montauk never managed to stay in bed until after the station’s simulated sun-rise, the added benefit of the place being open all-hours was one of the best strokes of luck he’d had since leaving the force.

“Two coffees,” said a voice from down the counter one morning. Montauk froze. It wasn’t that there was rarely a customer besides him this early in the day, it was that he could have picked that voice out from a crowd of ten-thousand. He turned slowly on his swivel stool and even though he’d known the raven-haired woman would be standing there, his jaw drooped a little when she tipped her large-brimmed hat in his direction.

Continue reading Apex Predators

Space is quiet. You might not notice during the day, when you’re bustling about, making sure the little pocket of atmosphere you set out in doesn’t collapse in on itself. But at night? At night even the churn of an Alcubierre drive isn’t enough to keep the dull thuds of your heart from echoing endlessly into the great empty. It’s the eternal beat, accompanied by every haunting thought, every neurotic inkling that dances through your vacant mind, all making the music of madness that keeps the sleep away.

Continue reading Among Sleepless Stars

The man trembled behind the thick pane of glass. He was all sweat, from the crown of his shaved skull to where his lower half disappeared beneath the table, the sheen of the overhead fluorescence making the beads of his anxious perspiration glisten like the scales of a fish. Watching him from the far side of the one-way glass, it was hard for Ellie to imagine the man in the fishbowl as the strong, confident leader that his file claimed he was. She’d only ever handled ranch hands and truck drivers before, rural folk who’d never hope to convince anyone outside Chaves County of what they’d seen. But now some CEO was sweating through his shirt in her interrogation room and Ellie honestly wasn’t sure which of them was more frightened.

Continue reading Patching the Dam

There was a beep. A beep then a sudden sense of cold that Mikaela had never known before. It was what freezer-burned meat must have felt like as it wasted away in the forgotten back corner of an ice chest, cold in the most absolute sense of the concept, abated by nothing. Then out of nowhere, warmth. A bead of heat that started so small she could barely recognize it. It grew until every ounce of her sang with a numb ecstasy. And then she was moving.

Continue reading On Ice